Railway ministry drops proposal to monetise stations on PPP mode

15 Dec 2022 CW Team

The ministry of railroads has rejected its idea for station monetisation through public-private partnerships, and projects are currently being undertaken through engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC). The railway ministry has been instructed to hasten the sale of other assets such as trains, goodsheds, hill rail, stadiums, railway settlements, and railway land parcels.

So far, the ministry has only raised Rs 18.29 billion against a target of Rs 300 billion for the current fiscal year. The likely revenue from asset monetisation of Indian Railways assets under the NMP (National Monetisation Pipeline) in the current fiscal year has now been estimated at Rs 49.99 billion.

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in a meeting with Niti Aayog CEO Parameswaran Iyer on November 14 reviewed the progress of NMP implementation. Earlier this year, the then NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant had said the government's plan to monetise railway assets by allowing private players to run trains did not attract enough investors due to lack of proper structuring and the railway ministry is looking at it afresh.

According to the NMP document, a total of 400 stations, 90 passenger trains, railway stadiums and colonies, and the famed Konkan and hill railways were among the assets identified by the government for monetisation. In August 2021, Sitharaman announced the Rs 6 trillion NMP over four years to unlock value in infrastructure assets across sectors. Niti Aayog in consultation with infrastructure line ministries had prepared the report on the NMP.

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